361–370 of 416 posts
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No, but powerful slaveholding interests were a major factor in the design of our government. It's the reasons our voting system favors low-population states--because slaves only counted as 3/5 of a person and the slaveholders were worried this would mean less representation in government and the danger that owning slaves would be outlawed.
The 3/5ths compromise was about giving less representation to slaveholder states, and was not a moral judgment on the value of slaves. Slaveholder states would have been perfectly happy for representation to be 1:1 for slaves vs. non-slaves.
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In fairness to Apple, they didn't just make other ports for the sake of it. When lightning mini was made, it was objectively better than mini-USB. When magsafe was made, it was objectively better than barrel plugs (and for charging, it's still better than USB-C.) Now that the standards are better, Apple is slowly transitioning to USB-C, which is a standard.
If by "slowly transitioning" you mean "massively and publicly driving adoption of USB-C", then yes, I agree. Apple has been pushing for the interoperable USB standard for as long as it has existed. The original iPhone was either the first phone to charge from USB, or at minimum the first successful mass-market phone to do so.
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USB-C cables are less durable than lightning cables. But the ports are more durable than lightning ports. I'd say that's a good compromise given the relative costs of a phone vs a cable. That said, my Nokia 6.1 had the USB-C port fail in just a couple of years. Apple's design for the USB-C ports on their laptops looks extra nice and durable though. They are machined out of the aluminium of the case itself.
My partner's 12" MacBook has a (single) USB-C port, which has become increasingly loose over time. To the point where she has to listen for the distinctive sound it makes when charging when she plugs it in, and wiggle the connector until it connects properly. So despite the apparent solidity of the machined shell, something in the system wears over time.
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Truly it's bizarre. Because the thing is, we can . Remember how in the early days of Expedia, flights were listed as crazy cheap, and then when you clicked through to buy, you discovered they'd tack on another 30-50% in fees and taxes? But that changed in 2012 when advertised airfares were forced to include all mandatory charges. Why they don't do that with all industries -- the ones you've listed, plus making it so…
the stranglehold of the two party system buoyed by corporate cash means that they only have to seem a tiny bit less bad than the other party. for better representation and a better society, we need election and campaign finance reform asap. unfortunately that doesn't serve the desires of the politicians or the entrenched parties, so we need to get creative about how to realign those incentives.
It’s never going to happen, see Citizens United v FEC and the upcoming 6-3 conservative majority on the Supreme Court. This is most unfortunate, and will only get worse.
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>This is the point of standards Except apple doesn't use standards. They use their own proprietary ports.
> Except apple doesn't use standards. They use their own proprietary ports. Actually Apple is pretty standards compliant, sometimes excessively so. I have no illusion that they are doing this out of the goodness of their hearts, but the idea that they "don't use standards" is a canard. For video they long used open standards (DVI, Displayport, HDMI, now standard DisplayPort over Type C); they were one of the first to…
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This is one of the few criticisms I can get behind. I think Apple could deflect a lot of criticism here for a comparatively small amount of money by simply offering a standalone brick as a free accessory to anyone purchasing a new phone.
But wouldn't everyone just take one then? And wouldn't that defeat the whole purpose of minimizing the e-waste?
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If by "slowly transitioning" you mean "massively and publicly driving adoption of USB-C", then yes, I agree. Apple has been pushing for the interoperable USB standard for as long as it has existed. The original iPhone was either the first phone to charge from USB, or at minimum the first successful mass-market phone to do so.
Apple definitely did not lead on USB-C. Premium Android and Windows laptops standardized on USB-C long before.
The Galaxy Note 5, released in August of 2015, used a MicroUSB port. I think we'd both agree that is a premium Android device, and clearly, "standardized on" USB-C did not happen "long before".
In fact, Android only introduced support for USB-C in 6.0, officially released in October 2015:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB-C#Software_support
So I'm quite sure your memory is faulty, on that one.
Given that the specification for USB-C was only finalized in August of 2014, I'm confident your statement about Windows laptops is equally off base.
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The problem is that the cables have a weakness that causes them to eventually break. Getting a new brick and cable to go with the phone solves that issue at least for a few years. With the new cable being USB-C, you can’t use the old brick with the new cable. The brick was also useful when traveling to places without USB-C ports or even other USB ports.
But that's the whole point. You'll buy one at that point because you need it. Giving people the brick whether they need it or not is what makes it wasteful and costly for all involved.
This incentivizes people to buy yet another Apple accessory. That and margins are the real purpose. One more foot into the Apple ecosystem.